THERE is a determined effort by some on the hard right of the party to re-write history and claim that Labour performed worse in last year’s London mayoral election than it did in the local elections throughout the rest of the country.
They are motivated by two goals. The first is to reject the policies of respect for different communities and anti-racism which were a key part of the Labour campaign in London. The second is to try to say that I personally lost votes for the party.
The trouble with this exercise is that it is based on an account of the elections that bears no relation to the facts and, as a result, draws entirely wrong conclusions for the future. By obscuring reality, it prevents the party from learning everything it can from the 2008 elections.
This is a serious matter, given the obvious problems for the party shown by the opinion polls, related to the fact that we will fight the next general election in the context of the worst economic crisis since the Second World War So what did happen in May last year and what lessons should be drawn from the experience by the Labour Party in London and, where applicable, nationally?
Nationally, the May 2008 local elections produced the worst result for Labour in more than 40 years. Overall, the party was 19 per cent behind the Tories. On 24 per cent of the vote, Labour was virtually on level pegging with the Liberal Democrats.
By contrast, in London, my vote as the Labour candidate for Mayor actually increased by 220,000 votes. My share of the vote, with 37 per cent of the first-preference votes, was 13 per cent higher than the vote obtained by the party nationally.
This was not, as some have claimed, due to the special prominence of the London Mayor position. Boris Johnson’s share of the vote was the same as the Conservatives nationally and Brian Paddick, the Liberal Democrat candidate, did considerably worse than his party at national level.
The reality is that Labour simply won a far large share of the vote in London than the average in the rest of the country. Indeed, if it had gained a similar share nationally, the result would have been hailed as a remarkable achievement in the circumstances.
It would obviously have taken a miracle to buck the national disaster last May enough to win in London, but we did far better than Labour nationally.
As we prepare for the general election, one of the discussions the party should be having is not a fake one based on myths and prejudice about the result in the capital, but a genuine fact-based one on what can be learned from London to improve the party’s national support.
I will highlight three issues. First, we built strong support among all of the constituencies necessary for Labour to win: the traditional working class, suburban employees and ethnic minorities by pursuing policies to improve their quality of life.
That meant things such as helping families with half price fares for all young people under 18 in full-time education, the greatest improvement in bus services in Britain, benefiting the outer London suburbs in particular, neighbourhood policing to make communities across London safer, radical measures to improve the environment and a living wage to help the poorest workers.
Where national policies conflicted with this, as with post office closures, we opposed them.
Second, we embraced the multi-ethnic mix of our city, celebrating and respecting the contributions of different communities and making no concessions to racism.
This led some to claim that I lost a so-called white working-class vote. If that were true, the Labour Assembly candidates should have been ahead of me in “white working-class” parts of London. In fact, I was ahead of the Labour Assembly list candidates in every ward in London and 9.5 per cent ahead overall.
The real lesson for the national party is the opposite. London is not uniquely multi-ethnic. To win in most English cities, Labour must secure the support of ethnic minority voters. Instead, with some ministers deliberately demonising minorities, it has lost ground in most of them, especially since the invasion of Iraq, losing control of working-class city after city.
Third, in order to defeat the Tories we need to unite the progressive majority of voters. That means both working with other parties to attack the Tories where we agree on progressive policies and, equally, challenging them where they talk left and act right or pander to local prejudices they think will win them votes.
A discussion about those actual lessons from London would help the Labour Party throughout the country.
